Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.”

This is a quote from Horace Mann, the first president of Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio...

This, according to many, is, or should be, the credo of the true American liberal...

When I take a gander at the political landscape these days, I find it very hard to imagine any politician in America being able to claim the true mantle of a Classic American liberal...

The closest we have come over the past few years was killed in a plane crass way back in 2002...

This ideal infers that putting the advancement of the country's people over the glamor of the individual ego, i.e., the politician who purports to slay the many dragons that assault the American public while taking donations from these very folks, is, or should be, the true motivation of a liberal in pursuit of a life worth living...

And all that Horace Mann asked is that this, winning a victory for humanity, only happens once in a lifetime...

Not all the time but just once...

It is a sad day indeed when this college, Antioch, one of the very first in the United States to admitted students for what they are on the inside and never once looked at race or sex as a benchmark for admission, is forced to close it's ivy covered halls and dorms and meeting rooms for good because there simply are not enough students interested in a true liberal education...

Once upon a time, folks went to schools, other good Ohio schools such as Oberlin that were founded mainly be religious sects, to better themselves and to pursue a good life that revolved around giving to the community...

Now, the main motivation to attend college is not to as a portal to learn but as a gateway to earn...

Too many institutions of Higher education in the United States today are, in many cases, gussied up vocational schools that churn out accountants and financial wizards and legal experts...

Where is the tradition off getting an education to better oneself spiritually and or intellectually ...

Is that tradition, the Classic American Liberal, going to disappear as more and more students are not motivated by the pure joy of living a liberal life...

Perhaps our society/economy has become so specialized that to pursue learning for the love of learning is no longer a viable option for the millions of students who have become so enamored by the comfortable suburban lifestyle they grew up in that they would mortgage their futures just to feel they had a crack at living as well or better than their folks...

A well rounded portfolio is more important than a well rounded spiritual or intellectual life...

I don't know, maybe I'm just a little cranky because another college is forced to close it's doors while billions of what should be education dollars are being frittered away in foreign lands or that billions...

Or maybe it's the great middle class catch that says to a student sure you can go to school but it will cost you dearly and you will be paying on your education probably for twenty or thirty years...

Saddling graduates with huge debt loads is, I fear, the newest method of precluding entrance into that upper class that clamors for Estate Tax relief...

Maybe America is growing up, facing the realities of the world and finds no need for great thinkers...

If so, then it is truly a time to mourn the Ideal America that exists in one less place today...

kick

K&R

This is some of your very best writing, IMHO....

If this is America growing up, then I want nothing to do with it...

Truly, a time to mourn...

Crap! :cry:

of a trend line in education which portends more alarming blows to the ideal of American renaissance.

Surely a summer of both sober reflection and behind-the-scenes collaborative strategizing will help dramatically change this sad course, come autumn.